The invention relates to blending and dispensing beverages, e.g., fruit juice reconstituted from concentrate.
Beverages dispensed in commercial establishments are often blended from water and a syrup or concentrate at the time of dispensing into a single serving container for the customer. In a widely used machine, solenoid valves controlling flow of pressurized liquids in different supply lines are operated for predetermined periods of time in order to provide predetermined amounts of the liquids to be blended.
In my U.S. Pat. No. 4,391,291 there is disclosed apparatus for mixing orange juice concentrate and water including two cylinders with pistons, one for metering the water and another for metering the concentrate. The concentrate is supplied from a hopper, and the metered concentrate and water are both supplied to and mixed in a second hopper.